Government has expressed sympathy with the heritage sector’s concerns over a key part of the Localism Bill, and committed to adjusting it to reflect the ‘intention’ of Amendment 149, which opposed the Bill’s explicit relaxation of statutory protection for England’s historic fabric and places.
Greg Clark has committed to ‘tweaking’ damaging paragraphs of the Localism Bill’s Schedule 12 (paras 22-24). This followed the introduction on 1 March of Amendment 149, by Birmingham Labour MP Jack Dromey in Committee, which proposed leaving out the offending paragraphs as they threatened to dismantle part of England’s heritage protection system.
In response to Dromey, Clark admitted that, ‘as drafted, the Bill gives rise to understandable concerns on the part of the heritage community…. although we are sympathetic to his amendment [149], the normal practice is for us to take it away and check with the lawyers whether any tweaks need to be made to it. We will come back at a later stage with something that reflects the amendment’s intention.’ (Col 701)
The full text of the exchange reads as follows:
Jack Dromey: These amendments—about which we are all clear—seek to ensure that neighbourhood plans are built on a robust, up-to-date evidence base and enable effective participation and involvement by all parties at all stages. However crucial neighbourhood planning is, it must be guided by strategic and national planning, for all the reasons that we have discussed at length. It must enable both national and international obligations, such as those concerning sustainable housing and renewable energy, to be properly delivered at the local level. Neighbourhood plans must be prepared under and be consistent with the strategic frameworks established in national and local plans, and be subject to the requirement to achieve sustainable development. The Bill does not include sufficient mechanisms to ensure consistency between plans at all levels, and the amendments seek to address that by requiring that plans at all levels be compatible.
The amendments also express our concern that the processes for neighbourhood development orders and plans do not include a mechanism for the full and proper consideration of environmental impacts. The Bill includes a provision to guide local authorities in relation to the proposed community right-to-build orders, where the proposals in the draft order would create unacceptable environmental impacts. We would like that provision to apply more widely to all neighbourhood development orders, and in the spirit of consistency in the Bill we hope the Minister is prepared to accept that. The amendments are familiar territory to the Committee—regarding the need to achieve sustainable development at every level of the planning process—and I do not propose to go over old ground, but I would welcome the Minister’s views and any clarification he is able to offer.
Amendment 149 raises a vital issue. It seeks to ensure that parts of our local and national heritage are not lost or damaged by the removal of key protections in law. That issue has been drawn to the Committee’s attention by evidence from across the heritage sector, which is concerned that the Bill seriously reduces protection for our most important historic buildings and their settings, and for the character of conservation areas, in a way that is entirely unnecessary, not least because of the framework already in place to defend our national heritage. This issue should be above party politics because it affects not only the places where our constituents live, but how they are able to care for that which we all cherish: our great national heritage—what it has meant to us in the past and what it will mean to us in the future. Our heritage assets include our great Norman castles, medieval market towns, ancient ports and prehistoric landscape, which are national assets but are local to the communities around them, forming part of their history and their future.
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Many other places could also be badly affected by the Bill. Our ancient archaeological sites, world heritage sites and registered parks, gardens and battlefields all rely solely on the planning system for their protection. Until now, the balance between local and national responsibility for the care of our historic buildings and places has been set out in a clear national framework of legislation involving the designation of places and buildings of special importance. However, people are not inspired by buildings alone or in isolation; they are equally inspired by where those buildings belong and how they are settled within the local landscape. The look and feel of the whole setting is crucial—imagine Wells cathedral in the middle of a light industrial estate. Likewise, our conservation areas, rural or urban, are so designated precisely because they represent such beauty and distinctiveness that we want to conserve them, which is why we have historically provided them with special protection from casual development.
The Bill, however, proposes to remove the statutory obligations that protect the setting of listed buildings and conservation areas in respect of neighbourhood development plans and orders. A neighbourhood development group need not, as local authorities must, pay special regard to the desirability of preserving the setting of listed buildings or the character of conservation areas when making planning decisions. We argue strongly that there is no need to remove those specific protections, which date from 1990 and have been regarded as a mainstay of our heritage.
In practice, the provisions could allow a neighbourhood development order to propose housing, commercial or retail development right up to the boundary of a listed historic house or registered park without statutory consideration for the damage that that would cause. Likewise, the character of a conservation area could be ruined by the development of a major retail outlet in the middle of a green space within the conservation area. The integrity of the conservation area could be wrecked by all householders being able to build on their back gardens, or industrial development could grow up to and within the boundaries, all without a legal requirement to consider the consequences for the character of the area.
I hope the Minister will agree that there is a wider issue of democracy for our country. The assets I am describing have a significance well beyond local boundaries. They are, in one sense, in the guardianship of local people, but they belong to the nation, which is why they have historically been protected by national legislation. I am thinking, for example, of the conservation areas of York, Cambridge, Chester, Bath, Durham or Winchester. A decision that threatened to wreck the heart of those ancient cities would hardly be a local matter; it would be a matter of national outrage. The Bill as drafted allows decisions that could ruin or compromise the setting of our most beautiful buildings and places to be taken by as few as 20 people.
The Minister might say, “Don’t you worry, Jack; that will all be put right by the national policy planning framework,” but I am bound to say that that will not be sufficient. Given the vital importance of our national heritage, the following points would help: if it were statutory; if we knew what level of detail would be included; if we knew clearly how it would relate to local and neighbourhood development plans; or, if we knew (Column number: 700) that planning policy statement 5, which is the vitally important planning guidance that protects our historical environment, would be incorporated fully. As it stands, we do not know any such things, but in any case that would not fill the gap left by the loss of statutory protection. (12.30 pm)
We are told that this part of the Bill is about transferring planning decisions to local neighbourhoods. Although nothing has been said about reducing heritage protection, I do not think for one moment that the Government intend to reduce that. Having said that, the current framing of the Bill means that we must ask the Minister about the Government’s intentions. Can he give us clear assurances that the Government do not intend to reduce heritage protections? Our communities care about the heritage they live with and they are assiduous guardians of it, but a robust, national statutory framework is of the highest importance. Grave concerns have been expressed by heritage organisations, and I hope that the Minister will listen to their voices and agree with the wisdom of our proposals.
Greg Clark: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s contribution, and I am delighted that we returned to discussing history, because we have missed our daily historical lecture—[ Interruption. ] Some of my hon. Friends do not share my taste for our history lessons, but I think they are in a small minority. In fact, I do not know what we will do after next week, when we do not have these sittings.
Two sets of amendments have been proposed and they reflect different themes. The first, in effect, is about the examination of neighbourhood plans to make sure that they are consistent with EU standards, environmental standards, and the rest. The second relates to the heritage aspect.
On the first set, it was clear from our extensive discussions that the national planning policy framework and its responsibility for lower-tier plans should be explicit and in the Bill. It is absolutely our intention that everything conforms to that, so that there is a trickle-down through the whole process. One test of the soundness of a neighbourhood plan—as the hon. Gentleman knows, that is a requirement for it even to go to a referendum—is that it has to be consistent with the local plan, which itself has to be consistent with national policy. We are clear, therefore, that that thread needs to run through everything, and the examination arrangements need to reflect that.
If the hon. Gentleman is content for us to do so, when we consider the discussions that we had about reflecting our intentions for the national policy framework throughout the planning system, we will do so for the neighbourhood planning aspect. To be clear, however, we absolutely intend that the relevant environmental and other EU standards should apply to neighbourhood plans, and we will present the system to Parliament to ensure that hon. Members are satisfied.
On the question of heritage, the hon. Gentleman anticipated my response, and it is certainly not the Government’s intention to weaken the protection for heritage assets. Although English Heritage has suggested that planning policy statement 5 should be revised and made simpler, that is very different from suggesting it (Column number: 701) should be weakened or dispensed with. The hon. Gentleman is right: as drafted, the Bill gives rise to understandable concerns on the part of the heritage community, not least the hon. Gentleman with his penchant for history. We want to make it absolutely clear that those concerns are not diminished in any way, but, in the usual course of things, although we are sympathetic to his amendment, the normal practice is for us to take it away and check with the lawyers whether any tweaks need to be made to it. We will come back at a later stage with something that reflects the amendment’s intention.
Jack Dromey: Once again, I welcome the Minister’s constructive response. I want briefly to respond to the two points he raised. First, it is helpful that he has clearly stated that the Government intend for there to be consistency. It is now simply about how they give effect to that, both in the Bill and through regulations. On that basis, we are happy for our dialogue with the Government to proceed, so we will not be pressing the amendment to a Division.
Secondly, it is also very welcome that we have agreed on the principle of the amendment. In those circumstances, I have no problem with the Minister checking on the appropriateness of the wording. I think he will find that it is pretty sound, but, given that we are agreed on the principle, it is about giving effect to that principle. So on that basis, too, I am more than content not to press the amendment to a Division, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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